Fleet Bank Connecticut, N.A. v. Carillo

In Fleet Bank Connecticut, N.A. v. Carillo, 240 Conn. 343, 691 A.2d 1068 (1997), a case concerning 36a-290 in the context of a third party creditor's setoff rights, our Supreme Court touched on the meaning of 36a-290 (a) with respect to an account holder's property rights. The court stated that 36a-290 "provides that, when an account is created in the names of two or more people, such account is deemed a joint account, and any part or all of the balance of such account, including any and all subsequent deposits or additions made thereto, may be paid to any of such persons during the lifetime of all of them. . . . Thus, under this statute, a bank is authorized to release up to the entire balance of a joint account to each and any coholder who so demands. In our view, this authorization not only provides protection for payor banks but also recognizes a sufficient property interest in each coholder to warrant characterizing all such deposits as a debt due to each coholder sufficient to trigger a third party creditor's statutory right to execute against the entire balance of the joint account." Id., 349-50. The court recognized that the two sentences in 36a-290 (a) should be read together and that they jointly serve to express the legislature's intent to protect banks by allowing banks to release any amount of funds to any joint account holder without subsequent liability. The court also recognized the right of each account holder to withdraw any or all of the money on deposit in the account and that the provision giving that right to withdraw codified a sufficient property interest in each account holder to substantiate a "'debt due.'" Id., 350.